


A Decent Yard

by sans_carte



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Clarke Is Into It, Clexa Week 2019, F/F, Fluff, Lexa Wears An Inordinate Amount of Flannel, Useless Lesbian Lexa (The 100)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-24
Updated: 2019-02-24
Packaged: 2019-11-05 08:34:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17915435
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sans_carte/pseuds/sans_carte
Summary: Clarke is useless when it comes to plants.  Lexa is useless when it comes to pretty girls.  Clarke just bought a house with an overgrown jungle of a yard and an old tree that looks ready to fall any day now, and Lexa is an actual honest-to-goodness, flannel-wearing lumberjack.  Lexa offers to fix up her yard because she wants to see more of this blonde doctor who can’t tell a rose from a rhododendron, and Clarke agrees because she wants to see more of Lexa sweaty in her work clothes.For Day 1 of Clexaweek 2019, prompt: Useless Lesbian.  (My first Clexaweek submission!)





	A Decent Yard

 

It’s only the prospect of a cold beer awaiting her at home that motivates Lexa to her final client meeting of the long, unseasonably warm Tuesday.  She’d consider rescheduling, but it’s a referral from Lincoln and she owes him a favor. The email seemed pretty straightforward: an evaluation of a possibly diseased tree that’s leaning over a house.  But the client’s name, “Clarke Griffin”, makes Lexa picture some douchey rich white guy who probably bought the property with his dad’s money in order to flip it.

She sighs as she pulls up in front of a modest single-family home in an up-and-coming part of North Polis.  It’s a pretty house but the small yard has definitely seen better days, with anemic grass ringed by overgrown boxwoods and a vine-covered fence.  She can see the tree, pitched at an alarming angle over the single-car garage; she’s surprised it hasn’t already toppled.

Hopping out of the truck with her clipboard, she leaves her flannel shirt tied around her waist, opting to remain in just her company logo-printed tank top.  Hopefully this guy won’t be the ogling type.

The doorbell rings twice, echoing inside the house, before the door swings open.  And Lexa’s brain goes blank.

Blonde, wavy hair, piercing blue eyes, the body of a goddess even in worn jeans and a T-shirt, a little beauty mark over lips that are opening slightly in a smile and saying--shit, she totally missed it.

“Um, what?” she stammers.

“I said you’re Lexa, right?”

“Yes! Sorry.  I’m here about your tree.”

“I kinda figured,” the woman says with a laugh, flicking her eyes down to Lexa’s chest.  She feels a blush bloom in her cheeks before she remembers--the tank top says Tree Crew. “I’m Clarke, if that wasn’t obvious.”

So, not a douchey guy.  Not a guy at all. Definitely not.

“Ah.” Lexa finally manages to scrape a couple of neurons together, and extends a hand.  “Nice to meet you.”

Clarke shakes her hand.  “Nice to meet you too. Let me just grab some shoes and I’ll show you the tree.”

She leaves the door ajar, revealing a bare foyer with a stack of cardboard boxes in one corner.  Lexa sees her bend over to tug on a pair of sneakers--and snaps her eyes up and away from the woman’s shapely ass just before she turns back around. _Focus, Lexa. Don’t be a creep._

“So I only moved in a month ago, but this thing already dropped a branch pretty close to the house,” Clarke explains as she leads Lexa around to the side of the house, where the tree in question grows up and over the garage. “I don’t know if maybe it just needs a couple of branches taken off or something.  I’m pretty useless when it comes to plants,” she adds with a shrug.

Lexa circles the tree to look at it, although she hardly needs to. Oak, probably fifty feet high and almost three feet around, limbs dark with rot and a trail of fungus down the trunk, where there’s a split she suspects came from a lightning strike some time ago.  It has virtually no leaves even though it’s well into April.

“It’s dead,” she states simply.  “I recommend removing it immediately.  The way it’s tilting, it could fall on your house in the next storm.”  She’s thinking about her schedule already, frowning. It’s a busy week, this tree is big enough to require a crane truck and a couple of workers...

“Yeah, definitely don’t want _that_ to happen.  Can you give me a quote?”

Lexa nods, jotting down notes and calculations on her clipboard.  When she hands Clarke the estimate, the blonde’s eyebrows raise.

“That includes labor, equipment, and disposal of the tree.  And you can find someone to do it for a little cheaper, but they won’t be as careful.  My people are good at what they do,” Lexa says proudly.

Clarke bites her lip, thinking it over. Lexa is immediately distracted. The blonde has pink lips and this cute little divot in her chin…

“Ok, let’s do it.”

“Ok!” Lexa says a little too quickly; she had almost been caught staring, again. She hurries to give Clarke some schedule options and they pick a time. “In case you need to cancel or something in the meantime, let me give you my card.”

Lexa grabs her wallet from her back pocket and fishes out a slightly worn business card from its interior.  Clarke studies it: it’s forest green, with the same geometric logo on Lexa’s tank top, her contact info, and embossed cream lettering spelling out “THE TREE CREW”.

“Your last name is Woods, really?” asks Clarke in amusement.

Lexa stops herself from rolling her eyes; she gets this all the time. “Yes, it is...and no, I didn’t change it for the business.”

“I guess with a name like that you kinda had to become a lumberjack, huh,” the woman jokes. Then she tilts her head, smiling mischievously. “Wait, is that a male term? What does that make you, a lumberjill?”

“Generally I go with ‘tree removal specialist’,” Lexa says dryly.  

Clarke does roll her eyes. “Ok whatever, lumberjane. I’ll see you Friday?”

Lexa can’t help smiling. “See you then.”

She’s a lot happier when she gets back into her truck than when she’d first arrived. She tells herself it’s because she landed her company another job and because she’s got that cold beer waiting for her. Not because of the pretty blonde who waves at her across the patchy lawn before heading back inside. Definitely not.

(Lexa waves back.)

(This is going to be a problem.)

***

When Clarke had emailed the Tree Crew address given to her by Octavia’s boyfriend Lincoln, all she originally wanted was an inspection and maybe a quote, so she could get this tree to stop dropping branches perilously close to her car.  She hadn’t known anything about the “Lexa” who responded to her email, except that Lincoln called her “intense, but really professional”; he used to work for her, apparently.

Whatever Clarke was expecting, the young woman who had arrived in a pickup truck late Tuesday afternoon and rang the doorbell was...not it.  She was in a dark tank top emblazoned with the words TREE CREW, revealing firm, tattooed biceps and a long, graceful neck, a flannel shirt tied around her waist.  She was also gorgeous. So really, one couldn’t blame Clarke for flirting with her. Just a bit.

And that must be why Friday takes longer to arrive than Clarke would like, even with a double shift at the ER.  Fortunately she doesn’t have to wait long after she gets up that morning. Lexa’s pickup appears as they’d agreed at 8 am sharp, pulling a trailer and followed by a large truck that looks like a cross between a cherry picker and a small crane.  

Clarke is already opening the front door by the time Lexa walks up, smiling at the brunette.  She’s in workboots and a different flannel shirt--is that her uniform? Clarke’s not complaining--and her long hair is pulled back in a single braid.

“Morning,” Clarke greets her.  “I parked my car out on the street so you could use the whole driveway.”

Lexa blinks at her.  “Thank you, that’s helpful,” she says. “You, uh, don’t actually have to stick around, by the way, we’ll be working all day.”

“You trying to get rid of me so soon, lumbergirl?” Clarke feigns offense. A hint of pink appears in Lexa’s cheeks under her light tan, as she fumbles for a response, and Clarke smiles. It’s been a while since she’s had so much fun flirting with someone, and Lexa is really cute and hapless about it.  “Just kidding. I’m probably gonna run some errands later, but I thought I’d offer you and your crew some coffee first.”

“Someone say coffee?” A guy comes up behind Lexa, buckling a toolbelt on. He looks more like what Clarke would’ve expected of a lumberjack, all beard and thick muscles.

“Roan, you already had a half-gallon of Dunkins on the way here,” says the third member of Lexa’s team, an older woman with close-cropped dark hair and a stern expression, as she gets down from the truck.  She hands Lexa a hard hat before putting on her own.

“Thanks, Indra.” Lexa looks back up at Clarke. “I think we’ll pass on the coffee and get started.”

“Well, if you all need anything, just knock.” She throws Lexa a wink before heading back inside, and notices with satisfaction as the woman trips over absolutely nothing.

***

The tree removal goes smoothly.  They take off the branches, then start in on the trunk, each member of the crew so used to working together that they barely have to communicate aloud.  Which is good, because the chainsaws are loud and Lexa insists they all wear proper ear protection (in addition to safety glasses and gloves). In fact, she and Indra long ago developed their own set of hand signals, which they teach to every new employee.

 _Bring it down,_ she signals to Roan.  He nods before engaging the crane bucket she’s currently in and smoothly lowering her down. She steps out onto the ground and signals for him to cut the engine.  Then she and Indra strategize for a couple of minutes about their final tasks.

“Are we going to leave the stump?” Indra asks her.

Lexa thinks about it as she takes her hardhat off, letting the breeze cool her sweaty scalp and neck. It isn’t as hot today, fortunately, but she’s still been out in the sun lifting equipment and wielding a chainsaw. “At least for today, yeah. This tree’s big enough, we’ll probably need the excavator to get at the rootball. And I should check with the client anyway, see if she wants to keep it. Turn it into a decorative piece or something.”

“I don’t think she cares much about the decor. You seen this backyard?” Indra scoffs.

Lexa casts a look around. ‘Yard’ is a stretch—‘jungle full of weeds’ is more apt. Though there are hints of potential—a former bed of roses, now spindly and unkempt, a low stone retaining wall along one side that still looks sturdy. “True, but apparently she just moved in.”

Indra eyes her, as if it’s weird that she’s defending this client. “There’s an old tire under those leaves over there.”

Lexa shrugs.  “I’ll ask Clarke anyway.”

“Ask me what?”

The blonde walks across the lawn to them, bearing a few bottles of water.  “Figured you could use these. As a doctor, I can’t let you three get dehydrated.”  Lexa, Indra, and Roan, who’s just hopped down from the truck, accept the water and give their thanks.  

Lexa tears her gaze away from the spark in Clarke’s blue eyes, and takes a sip of water to clear her throat.  “I was going to ask you about the tree stump. We can either remove it, but we’ll need to come back with some different equipment another day.  It wouldn’t cost you anything extra,” she clarifies. “Or we could leave it in place and grind it down, if you want to use it for ornamentation.”

Clarke looks blankly at her.  Lexa can almost hear Indra smirk next to her.

“Some people like to put bird-baths on them, hollow them out and plant flowers, that kind of thing,” Lexa explains.

“I’m guessing those people are mostly retired, or at least have more time on their hands than I do,” Clarke says with a wry smile.  “Not really my style. You can go ahead and remove it.”

Lexa nods.  Takes another gulp of water.  She likes Clarke’s smile. “What about the wood?”

“What about it?”

“I could use some of the wood from this tree to make you new mulch or edging for that flowerbed. Or let it season for that firepit.” Lexa points at the bed of gangly roses and the overgrown gravel-lined pit.  She isn’t sure why she’s offering; normally she just takes the wood to Anya or sells it to her mulch guy.

“Oh, it’s fine, I probably won’t get around to planting any flowers anyway.”

“You don’t really need to.  Those are perennials, in that flowerbed. Roses.”

“Seriously?” Clarke cranes her neck to look at them.  “Huh.”

Now Lexa stares at her.  “Do you know _anything_ about plants, Clarke?”

“Not really.” Clarke shrugs, staring back. “Do you know anything about treating a broken collarbone?”

Roan snorts.  Lexa feels a little abashed.  “Good point.”

Clarke looks around at the backyard.  “I want a decent yard eventually. It’d be great to have friends over out here.  But honestly I’m not home much, I’ll probably just have to get someone to clean it up and maintain it for me.”  She frowns. “Without charging me an arm and a leg for it.”

“I’ll do it.” Again, Lexa surprises herself with her impulsive offer. “The cleaning up part anyway.”

“I thought you just did, y’know, trees.” Clarke gestures at the Tree Crew logo on Lexa’s truck.

“I do some landscape design on the side.  More of a personal hobby,” Lexa concedes, warming to the topic, “but I’m thinking of expanding it as part of the business.  Trees keep us busy mostly in the summer and winter, but spring and fall can get slow.” She glances around the yard, seeing again the roses, boxwoods, and the low stone wall, the potential of the place.  “And I wouldn’t charge you an arm and a leg for it.”

“Really?”

Lexa nods.  “Just an arm.  I’m good on legs.”

Clarke smiles.  (It’s a serious problem, what that smile does to Lexa’s insides.)

“Well now, we should probably get back to it,” Indra interrupts, loudly.  “Right, boss?”

Only someone who knows the stern woman as well as Lexa does would hear the amusement in her voice.  Lexa blushes and settles her hardhat back on her head. “Right. Thanks again for the water, Clarke.”

“You’re welcome. Holler if any of you need a bathroom or anything,” Clarke says, and she heads back inside.  Lexa absolutely does *not* watch her go, in her yoga pants and Brown Medical School t-shirt…

An empty water bottle thwaps her on the arm.  “Ow!”

“Stop staring, boss.” Indra’s voice is dry as seasoned wood.

“Yeah, she’s a client, remember?” says Roan.

“Shut up,” Lexa mutters.  “I’m firing both of you.”

***

Lexa returns the following week with Roan and some machinery to remove the stump, but Clarke doesn’t get the chance to talk to her because she has to leave for a work shift not long after they arrive.  (She does get to see the woman in--not another flannel, but a denim work shirt that is just as attractive and so, _so_ gay.)  

So they merely exchange a wave as Clarke heads out to her car; Lexa’s wave is slightly hampered by the stiff safety gloves she’s wearing, but her grin is wide.

But Saturday, as they’d arranged, Lexa comes back to get started on the yard makeover.  Clarke smiles again seeing her at the front door, and this time convinces the woman to accept some coffee.  They sip from their mugs in the backyard and then the front while Lexa walks around and talks about plant varieties, shade, and landscaping options, and Clarke pretends to listen.

“So what do you think?” Lexa finally asks her.

“That sounds great,” Clarke says firmly, tearing her eyes away from Lexa’s animated hands and full lips.

“Which part?”

“All of it.”

Lexa puts a hands on one hip, looking slightly exasperated.  It’s back to flannel today, but Clarke’s checked the weather and she thinks there’s a good chance she’ll glimpse one of those tank tops again as the day warms.  “Clarke, I’m trying to get your opinions about what the yard should look like. It’s your house, it should be your vision--”

“Listen, I grew up in southern California, with two very busy parents,” Clarke interrupts.  “We had cactus and gravel instead of a lawn. So I honestly don’t know enough about--” she waved at the nearest shrubbery, “--holly bushes or whatever to have serious opinions about it.”

“That’s a rhododendron.”

“Ugh!”

Lexa’s green eyes are crinkled in a smile, though, and Clarke doesn’t really mind the teasing. “Anyway, what I’m saying is this is your forte.  If you really want, I’ll give you a budget limit, but I trust you, and your judgment. Just put in stuff that looks nice and doesn’t require much maintenance. Oh, and give me a place for a grill and having a few people over.”

“I can do that.” The smile comes through in Lexa’s voice as well.

“Good.” Clarke smiles back. “Well, I guess I’ll leave you to it then.”

Lexa nods. “Thanks for the coffee.” She hands Clarke the empty mug, and with reluctance the doctor heads inside. She’s already coming up with plausible excuses to go outside throughout the day.

***

Lexa pores over the site plan she’s sketched out like a commander studying her maps before a battle.  She’s planning a full-out assault on the stubborn cluster of Japanese knotweed in a corner of the neglected yard. There’s a smudge of dirt on her cheekbone, a mosquito is darting persistently around her despite the bug spray she applied, and her hair is frizzing a little in the heat.  

She’s loving every minute of it.

She likes her job, but it isn’t as much of a challenge as this kind of project, where she can get creative and make an outdoor space come alive with judicious weeding, carefully-balanced plantings, new paths, and other features.  Every weekend she’s over at Clarke’s working, plus a couple evenings when she was able to get away early.

The company might be another reason why Lexa is enjoying this project so much, she admits to herself.  

Clarke isn’t always there, due to her work schedule, but when she is home she always comes outside to say hi.  To bring Lexa a cup of coffee, ice water, or even a beer. To tease Lexa about her encyclopedic knowledge of plants ( _“you nerd”_ , the doctor called her bemusedly one day after she talked about ginkgo trees for perhaps a little too long). To just sit in companionable silence sometimes, sketching or painting while Lexa plants flowers or pulls weeds.  Clarke is an impressive artist, from what Lexa has seen.

She’s just impressive in general.  So much so that Lexa--never a very clumsy person, she uses a chainsaw on a regular basis for pete’s sake--trips over her feet, spills soil on her pants, finds herself at a loss for words.  She’s hopeless around this woman.

That’s how Lexa finds herself later that day with a stinging cut across her left palm, from a pair of secateurs that had slipped when she was cutting back the leggy roses and Clarke stepped outside with her sketchbook...and a pair of absurdly short shorts on.

“Ooh, that looks bad,” Clarke says with a sympathetic wince.  “Hang on, let me grab my kit.”

She darts back inside, while Lexa takes a seat on the top of the retaining wall she had cleaned up.  The doctor is back in a moment, and settles next to her with the first aid kit. She takes Lexa’s hand in hers and dabs at the cut with an antiseptic wipe.  It stings a little, but Lexa is too overwhelmed by the tingle racing from her hand and up her spine at Clarke’s touch to really notice. _Utterly hopeless._

***

“I hope you don’t normally injure yourself on the job like this,” Clarke says as she places a bandage over the cut.  Lexa could probably have treated it herself, but she likes having the excuse to be this close. The woman smells like cut grass and sweat and bug spray, but somehow it’s an appealing combination on her.  She smells _real._

“No, I’m usually more coordinated.  I swear,” Lexa says when the doctor arches an eyebrow at her.

“Have you had a tetanus shot in the last ten years? Because lockjaw is _so_ not sexy.”

“Yes, I have.  I’ll be fine, Clarke.”

God help her, Clarke likes the way Lexa says her name.  But then she turns Lexa’s hand to smooth the edges of the bandage, and notices something that sends a cold wave over all those warm flirty feelings.  It’s a slightly lighter band of skin around the base of Lexa’s ring finger.

“Are you...married?” _Shit, I didn’t mean to flirt with a married woman…_

“Not anymore.”  Lexa’s voice is suddenly quieter, a little guarded.  She rubs her thumb absently against the inside of her ring finger but doesn’t remove her hand from Clarke’s.  “The divorce went through in the fall. I wear gloves so much on the job, I guess the tan line hasn’t gone away yet…”

Now Clarke feels like a nosy asshole.  “I’m sorry. That must’ve been rough.”

“It was for the best, in the end.  We married young, we got all excited when they first legalized gay marriage in this state.  But it turns out we wanted different things.”

“Like what?” Nosy asshole or not, Clarke can’t stop herself from asking.

“I want to adopt,” Lexa says.  “At least one kid, hopefully two.  Costia came to realize she didn’t want any kids.  And that isn’t something you can exactly compromise on.  You either do or don’t,” Lexa adds with a wry half-smile.

Clarke has seen the way Lexa nurtures plants, how she places them carefully in the soil.  How she explains things about gardening and trees to Clarke without condescension. How, when she thinks nobody’s in earshot, she coos to the neighbor’s cat that often strolls into Clarke’s yard while she’s working, scritching him on the head.  “I think you’ll make a great parent,” Clarke tells her.

“Thanks.”  Lexa smiles, slow and shy, before she gets up and heads back to work.

Clarke watches her for a minute before going back inside to return the first aid kit.  She does not think about the ache she gets in her chest sometimes when a toddler is brought to the ER, sleepy with fever and cuddling close to their parent. She does not picture a kid playing with a hula hoop on the lawn Lexa is painstakingly resuscitating.  She definitely does _not_ replay that slow, shy, genuine smile over and over in her mind.

***

Lexa reseeds the lawn and installs a free-standing porch swing for Clarke.  She plants things that won’t require much care or watering, but also beautiful things--flowering plants, bushes with textured leaves--so that Clarke can paint them.  She keeps coming up with new tasks just to extend the project another day, another weekend.

Clarke doesn’t seem to mind.  She has invented a game where she points at random plants and trees in her and her neighbors’ yards for Lexa to identify.  “What’s that tree?”

Lexa barely glances at it as she focuses on the flowers she’s planting.  “Willow oak. It’s a bitch to rake up after, the leaves are narrow and slippery.”

“What about that one?”

“Japanese maple.”

“How about that one with the funky knob on the trunk--”

“Clarke, you realize you _are_ paying me to get things done.  It’s hard to do them when you keep asking me questions,” Lexa says, but she keeps her voice teasing.

The doctor huffs in fake indignation.  “I’m keeping you company!”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“Fine, you’re keeping _me_ company.” Clarke plops down on the porch swing.  “I haven’t been in town very long and I’ve been too busy to make many friends outside of work, okay? And it’s too quiet inside.  I’ve started playing NPR, for crying out loud.”

“Maybe you should take a class.  Join a sports league,” Lexa suggests, tamping down the soil around the base of the newly-placed plants.

Clarke wrinkles her nose.  “I would, but my schedule is really uneven.  Hard to make a class when your twelve-hour shift suddenly turns into twenty.”  She thinks for a moment. “I guess I could join a gym...But then I’ll probably just get hit on by gross bro-dudes who try to show me how to use the weights.”

“Not your type?” Is it just her imagination, or is Lexa trying to sound casual?

“Ugh, hell no.  When I date guys, they aren’t sexist meatheads.” Belatedly, Clarke realizes her phrasing basically just outed her as bi.  But...well, Lexa wears flannel and drives a pickup truck and has her keys on a carabiner and has been stumbling over herself since she met Clarke.  Time to shoot her shot. “Come to think of it, when I date girls I’m not really into meatheads either.”

Lexa doesn’t pause in her digging. It’s only because Clarke is scrutinizing her for any reaction that she sees--yes, Lexa’s ears are slightly pink, and she’s biting down slightly on her round lower lip.   _Score!_

A moment stretches between them, full of unspoken suggestion.  Lexa finally breaks it. “Do you want to come to a cookout?” She backpedals almost immediately, stammering.  “I--I mean, I wasn’t hitting on you, I just meant--since you’re trying to make friends…”

Clarke takes pity on her.  “I’d like that. Depends on my work schedule though, when is it?”

“Next Saturday, if it doesn’t rain.  My sister Anya has a bunch of land and a little pond outside of town.  She trains horses,” Lexa explains. “Every spring and fall I bring some wood from a project, and we have a big bonfire and cookout with some friends.”

“That sounds amazing.  Thank you for inviting me.” Clarke’s already picturing her work calendar and the email she’ll send ensuring she gets that day off.  She almost misses the small smile Lexa gives her, echoed in her forest-green eyes.

“You’re welcome, Clarke.”

Clarke stands up and goes to head back indoors.  “I guess I’ll let you work in peace now,” she says, stretching her back ostentatiously and noticing how Lexa’s gaze tracks the strip of exposed skin at her waist, the rise of her chest.  She smirks. “For the record, though, if you had been hitting on me...I wouldn’t have minded.”

She _saunters_ back to the house.

***

Turns out Clarke knows two people at the cookout already, besides Lexa: her college friend Octavia, who’s dating Lexa’s friend and former employee Lincoln, and Nyko, a specialist at the hospital where she works.  She gets along with everyone, though, joking around with Roan and sharing her marshmallow-roasting stick with Lincoln.

“Thank you for inviting me,” she tells Lexa at one point.  “This is really fun.” Her face is glowing from the fire and the beer, and Lexa couldn’t find her any more beautiful.

“I’m glad you came,” she replies.  She’s feeling alive, the dancing flames, sounds of talking and laughter, and scent of woodsmoke drawing upon something primordial and raw.  “This is one of my favorite things to do.”

“What, burn things? You should meet my friend Raven, she’s literally a pyrotechnics expert.”

Lexa smiles.  “No--well, partly the fire, but I mean get together with friends outside on a nice night.  It’s simple but good, you know?”

Clarke leans into Lexa’s shoulder.  “You’re a romantic at heart, lumberwoman.  You know that?”

“Anya says I'm a 'total cheeseball',” Lexa admits, making air quotes.

“It’s cute.”  The doctor tilts her head and for a moment their eyes meet, warm and searching.  Then Clarke grins and steps away. “I’m gonna go get s’more S’mores,” she declares.

“Okay,” Lexa manages, suddenly breathless.  She watches Clarke make her way around the fire towards Octavia and the S’mores supplies, and barely notices when her sister approaches her.  Not until Anya elbows Lexa almost painfully in the ribs.

“So have you asked her out yet?” Anya’s really better with the horses she trains than people.  They don’t mind her bluntness, or her tendency to show emotions via physical means.

“She’s a client!”

“And?” Seeing Lexa’s reddening face, Anya sighs. “Oh my god, you useless lesbian. _She’s into you_.  She wants your damn flannel-wearing babies.”

“That’s not even—she doesn’t—” but Lexa looks across the bonfire and sees Clarke nodding at something Octavia says.  Her gaze catches Lexa’s, though, and she smiles warmly.

Lexa smiles back without thinking.

Anya scoffs, drawing her attention back. “Ugh, you two are disgusting already. Just ask her out, Lex.” Her tone turns a little less sarcastic. “I haven’t seen you smile at a girl like that since you and Costia split up.”

“Clarke is...special.”

“Yeah, whatever.  Just do us all a favor and kiss her already.” Anya steals a swig of Lexa’s beer before she walks away, leaving her to look longingly across the flames at Clarke.

(When Indra spies this, she catches Roan’s eye and makes the hand signal for a tree falling over.  He laughs. Lexa notices this silent exchange, though, and makes a gesture that is _not_ part of the authorized Tree Crew code.  Roan laughs harder.)

***

Despite how much Lexa tries to drag out finishing up this project, finding reasons to stop by again, last touches to add, eventually there’s nothing more to do.  Both the front and backyard are beautiful. It’s time to part ways.

Lexa digs her toe into the gravel she laid around the front path pavers.  “Well it’s been a pleasure working on this. Guess I’ll have to find a new hobby project now,” she says half-heartedly.

Clarke tries to smile, but it doesn’t fully reach her blue eyes. “Yeah...I’ll be sad to lose my backyard coffee buddy.  But maybe you should come back every so often. You know, for the plants,” she adds in clarification, as Lexa’s gaze flashes up to meet her own.  “Without you here to water them and stuff, I’ll probably kill them in a month.”

Lexa tilts her head, pretending to calculate.  “I’d give you two weeks.”

“Hey now!” Clarke steps forward and pokes Lexa just below the collar of her shirt.  “I’m not some kind of angel of death!”

“Just to plants,” Lexa retorts.  Clarke’s finger is still resting against her chest, and her face is just inches away.

“Lexa…”

“Yeah?”

“I really, really want to kiss you right now.”

“Oh thank God--” Lexa closes the remaining distance between them and Clarke’s lips are crashing against hers.  It’s the natural culmination of weeks of attraction and it’s an electric shock. They kiss like there’s no tomorrow and like they’ve known each other for lifetimes.

Clarke pulls back for a moment, gasping.  “You know I’ve been flirting with you since the moment we met, right?”

“Not really.”  Lexa trails kisses along Clarke’s cheek, down to her neck.  “I’m pretty oblivious when it comes to flirting.”

“Yeah, no kidding.” Clarke bites back a groan, tilting her head back.  She doesn’t care that they’re basically making out in her front yard for all to see; she’s been wanting this for weeks.

“I’d much rather be direct.  Just tell you how beautiful you are.  How I got distracted by your eyes the first time I saw them,” Lexa says, between kisses along Clarke’s collarbone.

“Fuck, Lexa--”

“You know, I’ve never actually seen the inside of your house.”

Blue eyes darken, and Clarke steps back.  She grabs Lexa’s hand and, without another word, pulls her across the path, up the front steps, and into the house.

***

 

_Epilogue_

Lexa rolls onto her back, panting for breath.  “I want to take you on a date,” she declares.

Clarke snorts.  “Seriously? Lexa, you just had your tongue on my clit,” she says, eyes fluttering closed for a moment at the very recent and very happy memory.  “Plus we’ve already been hanging out for more than two months. I’ve met your sister. She menaced me with a marshmallow on a stick.”

“Yeah, but you’ve mostly seen me all sweaty and grungy from work.”  

“Maybe I like you sweaty,” Clarke says, husky voice raising goosebumps on Lexa’s skin.  She rolls over to straddle Lexa, sinking down to kiss her for a while.

A couple long minutes later, they break apart again.  “I want to do the date stuff,” Lexa insists. “Hold your hand for the first time at the movies.  Eat food. Walk you to your door.”

Clarke relents with a laugh.  “Okay fine, take me on a date.  Tomorrow night. But Lexa?” She bites her lip, as green eyes gaze expectantly up at her.  “Wear some flannel.”

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed, please leave kudos or a comment! You can find me on tumblr @ sanscarte. I'll be posting moodboards there for Clexaweek, along with a few more fics hopefully.


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